LG Chem forges battery partnership with Vietnamese company

SEOUL -- LG Chem, a top battery maker in South Korea, has forged a strategic partnership with a Vietnamese company for the supply of batteries for electric vehicles and smartphones.

A memorandum of understanding was signed last week between LC Chem and VinFast Trading & Production, a unit of Vietnam’s biggest private conglomerate, Vingroup JSC, which is building a factory in the northern port city of Hai Phong to produce electric motorcycles, electric vehicles and gasoline cars.

The deal reflects LG Chem's strategy to expand sales in Southeast Asia when its battery business in China was still down the doldrums. Beijing has excluded electric vehicles equipped with South Korean batteries from a list of eco-friendly cars eligible for subsidies.

The partnership will provide batteries for VinFast's scooters, electric cars and buses, smartphones and other products in the future, the state-run Vietnam News Agency (VNA) reported, adding that in the short term, the cooperation would focus on producing batteries for VinFast’s e-scooters.

VNA said that LG Chem would provide technologies for battery production and personnel training.

VinFast has signed contracts with Siemens Vietnam, a unit of Siemens AG, for the supply of technology and components to manufacture electric buses by the end of 2019. In June, General Motors agreed to transfer its Vietnamese operation to VinFast, which will also exclusively distribute GM’s Chevrolet cars in Vietnam.